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The closings will also permit a pretax write-off against earnings of $1.2 billion, the largest ever in the steel industry. That translates into a $650 million aftertax charge-off against profits for the fourth quarter of 1983. Roderick said that the company would invest $290 million in two new facilities in Indiana and Alabama. He claimed that these would make U.S. Steel the world leader by 1986 in continuous casting, the technology that allows the making of semifinished products without the intervening ingot stage.
But the company whose origins go back to Andrew Carnegie and that furnished the steel that helped build America for decades has drifted far from its hearths. In recent years it has invested in energy, chemicals and real estate. In the process, steel has become almost a sideline for U.S. Steel. In FORTUNE'S new survey of the most-and least-admired American companies, U.S. Steel ranked 241 out of 250. Moreover, FORTUNE classified U.S. Steel as a "petroleum refining" company in view of its ownership of Marathon Oil. Last year steel accounted for only about 30% of U.S. Steel's revenues; oil and gas were 50%.